Wednesday, April 19, 2017

God's Silence

Why would a good God allow evil to exist
in the world? The silence we encounter while reading the book is the silence we
go through after we have tried in vain to avoid suffering and
persecution.

Endo’s novel, written in 1966, is based on real events and
people. The story occurs in 1638 and revolves around a Jesuit priest, Sebastian
Rodrigues, who discovers that his former mentor, Father Ferreira, now a
missionary in Japan, has apostatized (he renounced his faith under torture). Rodrigues
doubts this and wants to go to Japan to find for himself but also encourage the
hidden and persecuted Christians there.While hiding, running from the Japanese authorities
and finally being imprisoned, Rodrigues battles with his faith and questions
why God is silent in all this suffering.

I, too,
stood on the sacred image. For a moment this foot was on his face. It was on
the face of the man who has been ever in my thoughts, on the face that was
before me on the mountains, in my wanderings, in prison, on the best and most
beautiful face that any man can ever know, on the face of him whom I have
always longed to love. Even now that face is looking at me with eyes of pity
from the plaque rubbed flat by many feet. 'Trample !' said those compassionate
eyes. 'Trample ! Your foot suffers in pain ; it must suffer like all the feet
that have stepped on this plaque. But that pain alone is enough. I understand
your pain and your suffering. It is for that reason that I am here.' ‚

'Lord, I
resented your silence.'

'I was not silent. I suffered beside you.'

'But you told Judas to go away : What thou
dost do quickly. What happened to Judas?'

'I did
not say that. Just as I told you to step on the plaque, so I told Judas to do
what he was going to do. For Judas was in anguish as you are now.' (307)

Endo, a
Christian himself, suffered religious discrimination and this novel is his response
to the near impossibility of the Eastern and Western cultures existing
harmoniously.

Reading this beautiful novel I asked myself whether we, as human beings meant to
err, do not emulate, at times, one by one, Father Ferreira, Father Rodrigues or
Kichijiro, a Judas-like figure. Aren’t we the ones who do not give up hope no
matter what, who question God’s existence and ask to be forgiven no matter how
intolerable our sins may be? Or, as Father Ferreira, we change our views and
give up our own beliefs because the circumstances demand we do so… Don’t we
sacrifice ourselves for the ones we love thus changing forever our dreams and hopes?

Rodrigues apostatizes but this is not the
end. It is in his heart that the love for Christ still lingers and the place
where God will answer his prayers and questions.

“He who has
heard the word of God, can bear his Silence.” Saint Ignatius